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Tuesday, July 19, 2011

SoCal Gets $739M In Venture Capital In Q2

Southern California companies raised $739M in venture capital in Q2 of 2011, according to the latest numbers from PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) based on data from Thomson Reuters. According to the MoneyTree report, released last night, Orange County led fundraising, with $319.3M raised for the quarter. Los Angeles had $222.5M in funding, and San Diego $198.18M in investments. Quarter to quarter, investments were up from Q1, when $585M was invested in the region. Investments were slightly down from Q2 of 2010, when the region saw $856M in funding.

Nationally, venture capitalists invested $7.5M across 966 deals, up 19 percent from the first quarter, when there was $6.3 billion invested across 814 deals. The report said that the investment level was the highest total in a single quarter since Q2 of 2008. In terms of industry, nationally, Internet-specific investments hit a 10-year high--up 72 percent in terms of dollars, and 46 percent in terms of deals, with $2.3 billion going into 275 companies in the quarter.

The largest investments for the quarter in Southern California were for Fisker Automotive, which raised $115M in the quarter; and Cameron Health, which raised $107M in funding. Both of those fundings significantly boosted the totals for Orange County. Other large deals included $40M in funding from ShoeDazzle, the celebrity-and-ecommerce startup headed by Brian Lee, former CEO of Legalzoom; $50M for biotech startup Sangart in San Diego; and $25M for clean technology firm Transphorm, which is based in Goleta.

The most active investors in Southern California companies were Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Versant Ventures, with four deals each. Other active investors were U.S Venture Partners, Domain Associates, and New Enterprise Associates, all with three investments each. Interestingly enough, the most active Southern California investors--investors located in Southern California, but not necessarily only doing Southern California deals--did not match that list, with the most
active firms (all with three deals each) being Rustic Canyon Partners, DFJ Frontier, the Tech Coast Angels, Amgen, GRP Partners, and Mission Ventures.